No Man's Land

Grade 5
by Julie Giroux
Commissioned by the Indiana Bandmasters Association
Premier performance was by the 2017 Indiana All State Band, Captain Michelle A. Rakers, Conducting.

This is a programmatic piece about a post nuclear apocalyptic Earth. Inspiration for the work was attained through hundreds of hours of research which included film footage and pictures of actual nuclear and hydrogen explosions, fallout shelters, movies which were about or took place before and after nuclear war and finally video games which take place in a post nuclear fallout Earth. The percussion section consists of primarily instruments derived from objects easily attained in such a world; glass bottles, iron skillets and plastic buckets. It may be performed to video footage from both actual footage and imagined footage via video games. Despite the title, it is a warm and visual work of hope for humanity.